Brett Kerry Earns Second Pitcher of the Week Award
The Rocket City Trash Pandas are proud to announce that pitcher Brett Kerry has been named Southern League Pitcher of the Week for the period ending on Sunday, September 18, the final week of the regular season. The weekly honor bookends a strong season for Kerry, who previously won the
The Rocket City Trash Pandas are proud to announce that pitcher Brett Kerry has been named Southern League Pitcher of the Week for the period ending on Sunday, September 18, the final week of the regular season. The weekly honor bookends a strong season for Kerry, who previously won the award for the first week of the Southern League season on April 17.
The award gives the Trash Pandas their seventh Southern League Pitcher of the Week winner in the 2022 season after Kerry’s first award opened the season, Chase Silseth earned the honors the next week on April 24 and again on September 4, while Coleman Crow took home the award three times, May 22, June 12, and June 26. The weekly accolade is the 11th overall this season for Rocket City, with Trey Cabbage, Orlando Martinez, Livan Soto, and Ryan Aguilar earning Player of the Week honors.
Kerry got the start on Saturday night against Birmingham and was stellar, retiring the first nine hitters he faced before a leadoff single in the fourth. After that, he retired the next nine hitters he faced, including striking out the side in the fourth, to end his final start of the regular season. He finished with six scoreless innings, allowing the one hit, walking none, and striking out eight. Three relievers combined to finish the 1-0 victory, giving Kerry his fifth win of the season and first as a starter since May 31.
The 23-year-old has spent the entire season with Rocket City, going 5-7 with a 4.46 ERA and one save over 25 games (20 starts). He finished regular season seventh in the Southern League with 118 strikeouts and tied with teammate Ky Bush for 11th in the league with 103.0 innings pitched. He ended the regular season well, going 1-1 with a 3.46 ERA and 14 strikeouts over 13.0 innings pitched in September.
Kerry began his professional career last season, making four starts for Low-A Inland Empire before a promotion to Rocket City for his Double-A debut in September. He was originally selected by the Angels in the 5th round of the 2021 draft out of the University of South Carolina.
Kerry and the Trash Pandas (81-57, 40-29 second half) will hit the road to begin the playoffs with Game 1 of the best-of-three North Division Series against the Tennessee Smokies (71-66, 34-34 second half) on Tuesday night. First pitch at Smokies Stadium is set for 6:15 p.m. Josh Caray will be on the call for 103.9 FM THE UMP and 730 AM SportsRadio.
Rocket City will return home to Toyota Field for Game 2 and Game 3 (if necessary) on Thursday night, September 22 and Friday September 23. Great seats are still available for both games and can be found online at trashpandasbaseball.com.